Dive Brief:
- Custom branded emojis are coming to Twitter, and a Coke ad campaign is first in line.
- The custom emojis, known as “hashflags,” had been available for special events, but this is the first time they are part of a larger ad partnership.
- Coke’s partnership with Twitter gives the brand access to first market offerings, so it’s expected that custom emojis will soon become an ad option for more brands.
It's the cheers heard around the world! Tweet with #ShareaCoke to set a record for World’s Largest Twitter "Cheers!” pic.twitter.com/liGFMGofpJ
— Coca-Cola (@CocaCola) September 17, 2015
Dive Insight:
Twitter has offered custom emojis for special events like the VMA awards and New York Fashion Week, and to promote the upcoming Star Wars movie, but never as part of an ad campaign. That has changed with Coke’s #ShareaCoke promotion that features a custom emoji of two Coke bottles clinking in a toast whenever the hashtag is tweeted.
Ross Hoffman, senior director of global brand strategy at Twitter, told TechCrunch, “Coca-Cola is a massive global partner of Twitter and they have been pushing us for some time on building a custom emoji (along with the creative agency of W+K). We know that people love using emojis and usage has been significantly increasing over time on our platform. This was a perfect opportunity to work with a nimble and smart marketer to make this happen.”
Coke is essentially testing custom emojis as a new ad unit for Twitter. On this Hoffman said, “One of our core values at Twitter is #ShipIt. We want to test things and Coca-Cola was the right partner to test with here. We have established trust over the years and we are excited about the learnings we will get from this initiative. The data we get back will help determine the future on what we do with this as a product.”
